


empty eyes behind dusty glass

by en-sam-malas (Hugabug)



Category: Black Friday - Team StarKid, The Guy Who Didn't Like Musicals - Team StarKid
Genre: Closeted Character, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Established Relationship, Implied/Referenced Abuse, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Homophobia, M/M, Married Couple, Past Child Abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-12
Updated: 2020-04-12
Packaged: 2021-03-02 01:15:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,323
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23576767
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hugabug/pseuds/en-sam-malas
Summary: Gently, Xander picks the portrait up from its place in the box, cradling it close for a moment in a sort of whimsical hope that the force of his own embrace may somehow make the boy in the photo feel less alone, before he carefully wipes the layer of dust from the glass with the pad of his thumb.Silently, he brings it to his husband and gives it to him. A question hanging in the air between them.John hears it loud and clear.---or in which John was serving in the US military before the repeal of the Don't Ask, Don't Tell act (something that plays heavily into his trauma) and Xander is a very understanding and loving husband.
Relationships: Xander Lee/John McNamara
Comments: 14
Kudos: 45





	empty eyes behind dusty glass

**Author's Note:**

> I was a little sad that the Langs cut out some of John’s backstory from Black Friday for time constraints (but I don’t blame them since I recognize that staying on the track of the main story comes first) so I went ahead and filled in as many blanks as I could.

The boy in the picture stares at Xander with tired eyes.

They had been unpacking, the both of them, silently enjoying each other’s company as they unearthed their life from the boxes they had packed it into, with John working on the books for their library and Xander working on the little knick-knacks they’d accumulated over time. Things had been going smoothly all day, the hours of work broken from time to time with happy kisses and impromptu embraces that Xander enjoyed turning into silly dancing in the halls of their new place. He was giddy, so was John, and in that giddiness, Xander had brought in and opened the wrong box, finding himself face to face with a ghost.

It’s an old portrait, one taken from John’s days back in the marine corps in California, with his black and red uniform and his white hat that was perhaps too big for him. It sits awkwardly on his head, balanced precariously on the jut of his ears and hanging low over his brow. He’s young, in the photo. Very young. Too young, Xander thinks, for eyes that look so old and so pained. There’s an air of resignation to him, a heavy aura of loneliness that surrounds him like miasma and makes something in Xander’s chest ache. Gently, he picks the portrait up from its place in the box, cradling it close for a moment in a sort of whimsical hope that the force of his own embrace may somehow make the boy in the photo feel less alone, before he carefully wipes the layer of dust from the glass with the pad of his thumb.

Silently, he brings it to his husband and gives it to him. A question hanging in the air between them.

John hears it loud and clear.

At first, he’s surprised, but quickly the surprise morphs into a look of world weariness that matches that of the boy in the portrait. With a cough, he puts out his cigarette and lays the photograph on a nearby pile of unopened cardboard boxes. It’s late, the sun outside their brand new apartment filtering in through the windows and illuminating the bits of red interwoven through the golden curls that surround John’s head like a halo. A sharp contrast to the boy in the photo, whose beardless face and buzzed cut hair bear little to no resemblance to the organized chaos that he would later grow into. For a long moment, John stares at it and Xander stares at John, trying to fathom the swirling emotions behind his eyes, the shadows that never seem to find their way to the surface but are now being violently excavated one by one. It hits Xander, then, how little he knows of John’s past, what he was like, before PEIP, before he became that upstart lieutenant colonel that Xander fell hopelessly in love with. John had never talked about it-- not really, not in depth. There’d be throw away comments from time to time, sometimes a small anecdote would find its way into the conversation if the situation called for it, but they were far and few between, and Xander had never been one to press or ask for more. If John were to share, it would always be on his terms. Besides, for the both of them, it had always been about the present, especially in the field or under fire, where the past was nothing but unnecessary baggage while the future remained to be a hazy uncertainty when confronted by open threat.

But now, in their new shared apartment with John’s impending promotion to brigadier general and their courthouse marriage still a fresh, happy memory in their mind’s eye, suddenly the past and their future have never been more present.

And John can feel it too, judging by the soft, sad smile that he offers up as some sort of truce. He sits on the floor, extending a hand to Xander, who quickly takes it and moves to join him. The photograph stays on the boxes, out of sight and reach, but its presence is otherwise palpable. Xander waits.

When John speaks, it’s almost a whisper. “I told you about my mother--” He pauses, and in that silence, Xander remembers the whispered tale shared in the dark of a woman who had loved John but quickly turned her back on him when she had caught him writing love letters to a boy in his high school class. It never escaped Xander’s notice that John had only ever told him this in moments when Xander couldn’t see his face, see the pain that would no doubt be reflected in his eyes. Nevertheless, the hitches in his voice and the cracks in his words were enough for Xander to know the extent of the hurt.

He squeezes his husband’s hand. John squeezes back.

“By the age of eighteen, I was on the streets more than I was at her house. No home, no money, and no way to secure a future. At eighteen, where else would I go? All I had was a high school diploma and painful, emaciating hunger.” He shrugs. “I had no other choice.”

Xander lets out a shaky breath. “So you traded out an abusive situation for--”

“Another one? Yes. But at least in this, I was being paid and fed.”

Xander hangs his head-- he understands too well the desperate need for escape that often pulls the downtrodden into the institution that is the US military. The promise of a steady income and a place to stay had been as tempting to him as it had most likely been to a young John. The only difference, of course, was that for Xander, PEIP had been his home from the very beginning. John-- John had to work his way up and away.

Again, the image of the boy in the picture makes its way to Xander’s mind. It’s hard to recognize his John in him, the austere young man held upright by little else but the anxiety that comes with the harsh promise of systemic exclusion. Not when his John is full of softness-- soft curls of strawberry blonde hair, soft touches, soft concern for all those under his leadership-- and a sense of purpose that molded him into someone who opened his arms and heart up in welcome to all kinds of people. It took a lot to get here, to a place where he was respected and loved, and the journey had not been easy.

Carefully, Xander moves closer to John, as close as anatomically possible, and rests his chin on his husband’s shoulder. John automatically answers the gesture with one of his own and turns his head until they’re nose-to-nose, the shades of green and blue in his eyes shining with unshed tears.

“It was difficult, Xan.” he admits in a tone so quiet Xander nearly misses it. “Don’t ask, don’t tell. I had a fellow officer-- a friend. My only friend. Her name was Audrey Jessop. She and I were deployed together. When she was outed, every minute between then and the moment she was removed was hell for the both of us. For her more than for me, of course, and I was glad I was there to protect her, but in the end, when she was discharged from action I-- All the slurs, the beatings-- I had to sit there and take it--”

Xander doesn’t need to hear any more. He closes the distance between them, presses his lips to the trembling ones of his husband, and John loses no time in kissing back, shuffling in closer and closer, until the last of the grief is lost to the careful tenderness of aching scars and the hands that do their best to soothe them.

When they part, both their cheeks are wet.

“I’m so sorry, John.” Xander finds himself saying, cradling his husband’s jaw in one hand, burying fingers into the curls of his hair with the other. “I’m so sorry--”

John shakes his head. “It’s past.”

“It’s _your_ past, John.”

“And it’s _past,_ Xander.” Another shake of the head. John closes his eyes. “If I knew where it would lead me…”

He trails off, tipping his head forward until he’s buried in the crook of Xander’s neck. They stay there awhile, watching the shadows lengthen on the floor as they listen to each other breathe in the stillness. Usually, chatter is Xander’s fall back, his brain itching and working on overdrive in the absence of background sound, but at this moment he is content to hold his husband in his arms, fingers carefully combing out the tangles in his hair while his other hand soothingly runs a path up and down his back. In the dimming light, they rest in silence, until the last bits of sunlight finally give way to the blanket of stars above. Finally, the darkness stirs them both into motion.

Xander makes it off the floor first, pulling John up with him before feeling his way to the light switch. He finds it, easily, and with a click the bulb overhead illuminates their soon-to-be study. In the sudden light, the room looks rich, with its cozy furnishings and the newly built-in shelves that line every wall without a window. It’s still largely empty, but despite the bareness there were already bits and pieces of them that had managed to seep through. The carpet on the floor was plush and soft under Xander’s socked feet, a luxury they had both wanted for so long. In a corner, an old tartan armchair Xander had owned since forever and would have gotten rid of, had John not loved it so much. Right next to it, close enough that their armrests might touch, sits an elegant and sleek leather recliner, a gift John had gotten him months ago. More of their life together rests in the still unopened boxes strewn across the hardwood floor, waiting to be unpacked and put away, like pieces of a jigsaw puzzle clicking together to form a beautiful landscape of colour. Xander soaks it all in for a moment; the future within their reach, one that they can finally enjoy. They are good people who have been through enough-- they deserve this.

 _John_ deserves this.

Xander turns to tell him just as much, but the words are immediately stopped in their tracks by John, who’d stepped in close and kissed Xander again, this time more firm, long and lingering in a way that tells Xander that he’s amazing. It lasts all of an eternal second, and when John moves to part from him, Xander follows him for more, which John gladly gives, curling fingers into Xander’s shirt, wrapping an arm around his waist. Bringing him close, closer than what Xander thought to be humanly possible, and for an eternity and a moment, they stay like that. Connected and intertwined. Drinking each other in until whatever made Xander _Xander_ and John _John_ turned into something so irrevocably and irreversibly _Xander &John _ it made him sway with the weight of two.

When they part for a second time, Xander blinks, dazed.

“What was that for?” he asks, in an awed whisper.

John chuckles, equally as dazed, looking at him like the whole world was spinning and Xander was the only one standing still. “If I could go back and tell him, Xan.” he says, with a sigh so happy Xander feels it in the soles of his feet and the tips of his fingers. “I would tell him that no matter how dark the night got or how painful the road grew, at the end of it all, there would be you.”

Xander’s throat closes up like it always does when John gets like this-- soft and sweet in his arms, loving despite all the pain he’d been through. He always knew that John was strong, but in this moment of quiet, in this tiny sacred alcove that they’ve built for them and them alone, Xander has never been more in awe of this wonderful man he was allowed to hold so close.

“You--” he starts, hearing the crack in his voice as he tucks a stray lock of hair behind John’s ear before gently swatting him on the arm. “You are a _bastard_ , you know that? Don’t say things like that out of the blue my heart can’t take it.”

His husband laughs, a big guffaw that Xander feels in rumbles in John’s chest just as much as Xander hears it in his ears, filling his head and stomach with so many happy butterflies he can barely see straight. John is so beautiful like this. Head bowed, smiling like he just couldn’t help himself. Xander takes it in, memorizes him, burns the image of his dopey, smitten husband into the frontal lobe of his brain. This. This is the last thing he ever wants to remember.

“Come on,” he says, after a moment, reaching out to trace John’s bottom lip with his thumb. “I think we’re done unpacking for today. Let’s go at it again tomorrow.”

John nods in agreement, parting from Xander unwillingly, transferring his grip from around his waist to Xander’s offered hand. Before they could leave the room, however, Xander picks up the boy in the portrait, that lonely young man with the world on his shoulders and no foundation beneath his feet. Xander picks him up and holds him up for the both of them to see. “I would love to get to know him, John.” he says, softly, gently, words pleading but open, kind and careful. “If you’d like to tell me.”

This time, John’s smile grows sad, haunted around the corners and not quite reaching his eyes-- but it doesn’t disappear, and seeing it makes Xander’s heart lighten. “Alright,” John says with a squeeze of Xander’s hand. “What would you like to know?”

**Author's Note:**

> I'm not as proud of this one-- I'm still struggling with getting the boys' voices right, but I am proud that I finished it.
> 
> [tumblr](https://www.en-sam-malas.tumblr.com)  
> [my McNamander tag](https://en-sam-malas.tumblr.com/tagged/mcnamander)


End file.
